My Sweater Journey Progress

I am knitting the Featherweight Cardigan by Hannah Fettig in Elegant Yarns Athena lace weight yarn 202 Pink colorway.  I am using my Chai Goo 47" circs, U.S. size 5 - 3.75 mm.  

I started this cardigan on February 6th and very late last night, or more accurately very early this morning (2 am), I divided for the sleeves!!!  I never thought I would be knitting a sweater for my very ample self in lace weight yarn.  I loathe to admit this, but I am knitting the largest size.   I don't like close fitting sweaters. I want this to float away a bit.  

I am sorry that the picture isn't neat and tidy, but photography just isn't one of my favorite pastimes.  Enough blathering for now.  I need to keep knitting!

Stay yarn crazy!

Sweater Envy & Shopping My Stash

Why is it that i can knit or crochet any baby sweater pattern that I find, but I cannot make a sweater for myself that I like when it is finished?  I am so envious of knitters who have lovely sweaters that they knit for themselves and actually wear those sweaters.  I'm envious for several reasons, such as:

• That you are skinny, so you can afford really nice yarn for your sweater, as it only requires 2 skeins when I need 10 skeins, so I settle for yarn that will not make me happy.
• That you are skinny, so you can knit a sweater in a week, while I need a year to complete my size.  (Are you sensing a theme here?)
• That the pattern fits your skinny body, just as it is written, but I must alter every pattern for my super-size, lumpy-bumpy, extra curvy body. (Theme continuation)
• That you can seemingly wear your sweaters all year round, while I need it to be sub-zero so that I don't perspire to the point of becoming a felted wool puddle.

I'll stop with just those points, simply because I don't like myself for even thinking these negative thoughts to list them, but truthfully, I do get so frustrated that those thoughts run through my mind.  The "theme" seems peevish and I realize that it sounds like I don't accept any accountability for why I need 10 skeins.  I am very well aware that I am responsible for how obese I am.

Unfortunately, this week I let my frustration spill out in a Ravelry forum asking why designers don't take x, y, and z into consideration when writing a pattern?  Essentially, I was selfishly asking why don't the designers write all of their pattern specifically for ME?  I was couching my questions in the guise of "all of us plus-sized people", but in retrospect, it was all about me.  I am so very sorry.

Fortunately, the responses were not mean.  Instead I was educated.  A lot of what they posted, I knew, but apparently needed a kind reminder.  Some posted from the designers perspective and some as knitters.  I am grateful to them all.  

I did know that it is impossible to write a pattern that will work perfectly for every body, but at that moment, I needed to be reminded.  What I didn't realize is that rarely is a pattern perfect for even most of the knitters.  Almost everyone needs to learn how to customize a pattern for individual body specifics and preferences.  I need to learn how to customize patterns for my body specifics and my fit preferences JUST LIKE EVERYONE ELSE.   Can you say wake-up call?  Yeah.  

I have decided to make this year my year of sweaters.  I am hoping to learn and grow in my understanding of the construction and customization of sweaters to fit me personally.  By the end of the year I would like to design a sweater specifically for me.  My first step is to take the Craftsy class, Fit Your Knits. The forum responses also recommended that I check out a couple of other resources that I want follow up on and to share:

• Ravelry Group & Pattern: The Tailored Sweater 
• Ravelry Group:  Fit to Flatter 
• Book:  Little Red in the City 
• Website:  Custom Fit

The first sweater I am casting on is the Featherweight Cardigan by Hannah Fettig.  I chose this sweater because one of my reasons listed above for not liking a pattern is that I need it to be extremely cold before I can wear it or I get overheated.  I will be using lace weight yarn for the Featherweight cardigan so I am hoping that it will address that issue.   

I was also put off by how much it costs for me to make a sweater in my size.  I decided to try to find enough yarn in my stash, even if I had to use several different yarns by striping it.  What I found was a yarn I had forgotten I owned, Elegant Yarns Athena in the 202 pink colorway.  I have 4 skeins which equal 3200 yards, more than enough to do the largest size of the sweater.  Best of all, I purchased the yarn at Marden's Discount for only $2.50 per skein.  My sweater will cost $10.  Shopping my stash FTW!

In an effort to not get too distracted from this mission (SQUIRREL!!!) I have cast on for the Featherweight cardigan.  Since this pattern is miles of stockinette, I figured that I wouldn't have to try learning fitting techniques while trying to maintain a stitch pattern.

All of this is speculation on my part since this will be a learning process.  I will TRY to blog about this journey.  If you have been to this blog before or taken a quick look back at prior posts, then you know that I am not a consistent blogger, so I will not make any promises that I am not sure that I can keep.  Thank you for stopping by and if you have any advice or comments, please leave them below for me.

I hope you stay yarn crazy!

Love getting the mail!

Saturday was a very good mail day. Three packages were delivered to our apartment on Saturday! One was from Wonderbook and contained 10 books on baseball. HUH? Okay, that package was for Ray.

The second package is this beautiful and incredibly soft fiber from CJ Kopec Creations for her June SAL. It is BFL! This is so soft that I just wanted to pet it like a new born kitten. I let it caress my face and I started to put a bowl of milk down for it before I came back to my senses and realized that it isn't a pet. I am still trying to decide how I want to spin it.
The third package I knew exactly what I was going to do with it. I had ordered from Knit Picks the Comfy worsted weight in the Peony colorway so that I could knit the Hey Teach! sweater that is in Knitty Summer 2oo8. I love that sweater and the Knitting Purls group on Ravelry is running a Sweater KAL and a Summer Hotties KAL that this will qualify for. Plus, there are a few others in the KAL knitting the same sweater so if I need help they will be there for me and visa versa. I was so excited that I let the yarn jump on my needles as quickly as possible. I actually swatched! Gasp! It only took 2 swatches to get gauge and I am using a size 9 circular for this (the pattern calls for an 8). Here is my start, yesterday morning. This is the first time I have ever used Knit Picks Comfy yarn and I must say that I love it. It has a wonderful hand feel for a cotton blend and is draping wonderfully for me. It is truely a pleasure to knit with. This was my progress as a of 2 am this morning on the back of the sweater. Insomnia can be a knitters best friend.I am off to start the lace work on the bodice back. Wish me luck as I have never successfully made a sweater that required seaming or lace work, but I have my KAL mates to help if I get stuck.

I have finally finished my Sweet Sweater #2 . This is not how I envisioned it when I started it, but I think it turned out okay. It was made with size 5 thread in cream and lilac (brand unknown) on a 3.25 mm steel hook. The Sweet Sweater Pattern is designed to be a custom fit, so I would estimate this top to be about a 4X. It took me about a month to complete while I was simultaneously working on a couple of pair of socks of which I previously posted pics.

Below is a picture of the neckline detail.

The picture below shows the bottom edging.

Now I have to complete my bear and the bear's doll for the 2008 ThreadTeds Challenge.

Ravelry Sweet Sweater CAL

I recently completed a CAL in the yahoo group Plussize Crochet that involved the Sweet Sweater . I wasn't convinced that I was finally going to be able to make a garment that would actually fit me for the first time in my life, so I wasn't willing to invest in a nice yarn. Instead I used Caron Pounders in Azure and Cape Cod Blue that I had on hand from afghans I had previously made. Suprise! It fits and I wish I had invested in a better yarn for apparel. (pictured to the right) I love this pattern because it is more of a formula for customizing the garment to the person it is intended for, no matter what size they are! Amazing, huh?

Well, because of this I have joined another CAL for the same pattern in Ravelry's Crochet A Plus group. This time around, I am using a cotton blend, size 5 thread of unknown origin and a 3.25 mm steel hook. When I first started it I was using a much smaller hook and found that the increases where not turning the corners for the raglan sleeves properly and I ended up frogging several hours of work only to start over again with the 3.25 mm hook. It was immediately apparent that this was going to make all the difference in the outcome. To the left is a picture of it in progress after the correction and you can see how the V neck will come together. This should be a much lighter weight top for summer. I plan to do some open work on the bottom half of the top to be worn with a tank top or cami. When I complete it I will post a picture. Now I need to check my groups and then get back to the yarn.